4

patrons

Hi there! I make a bunch of art and I’m bad at it.

Most of my efforts are directed towards music, audio production, podcasting, photography, graphic design, and poetry. I’m still working out the best ways to use Patreon, and I would love your suggestions. I want this to be fun! 💝💝

The first thing I’m gonna do here is make a patron-only podcast which you can get via the RSS feed here. I’m gonna call it trash tapes for now because a) that’s what it is and b) i have no better ideas. It’s less a ‘podcast’ — zero production value! — and more of like, the ultra audio dumpster I’ve always wanted to build. It’s yrs for the diving.

For the first while, everyone, including the bumblebee moths, will have access to 100% of the trash tapes (why? because no one likes me and I’m pretty sure literally only one person will sign up for this. that’s why) but come January 1st, 2020, only wonderpups & up will have access to most of the new stuff in the trash tapes. Pretend it’s a trial period or something. Also,

Please no one become a green mage. I’m serious.

that’s p much the gist of what’s up with this, but if u wanna know more, well here goes:

Ok so, long story long.

At the time of writing this, I’ve been a part of nearly 200 music releases, self-published three limited-edition books & zines, and produced about 50 podcast episodes.

Alright, uh, I feel like I’ve done a lot of things? but also I’m not anywhere close to breaking even financially. I’m currently working full-time to save up enough money so that I can spend a couple years practicing, writing songs, and hopefully traveling. Basically all I want to do in this life is make art and walk around. This is going to take a small amount of money, and then there’s also expensive junk I want to do, like zapping this stupid beard off of my face. I’m crossing my fingers for a world where I can have a couple part-time jobs, and that one of those jobs will be my own artwork.

Sometimes I get frustrated and depressed, which makes me need to take breaks from the more stressful art projects, but I hope my long pattern of activity will make you feel confident that your patronage is worthwhile.

I’ve been playing drums, writing songs, and experimenting with digital audio workstations since about 2002. I put out what I once considered to be my first so-called official release, a noise tape titled Frank, in 2008 when I was 16. Although, depending on whether your definition of ‘music album’ is a lil bit po-mo or not, my first ‘release’ was in like 2003.

Everything has been self-published and I’d like to mostly keep it that way.

My main musical project began officially in 2008, and I alternate between solo work and collaborations, with 15 releases comprising various albums, EPs, singles and mixtapes. You can download the archive, along with future releases, for $6.66/year on the Bandcamp subscription.

Citizen Scientist is my outlet for musical experimentation, with new music pretty much every Friday. Beginning in 2015 with a series of improvised noise rock albums, the 150th Citizen Scientist release is scheduled to be published by January 2020. You can download the archive, and future releases, for $6.66/year on the Bandcamp subscription.

Prairie Goth is the podcast and blog I started in late 2015. The podcast began as an excuse to have conversations with artists I admire, and grew to include various audio and spoken word experiments. In its first two and a half years, the show ran about 50 episodes, including about 30 interviews or conversations with artists, and two episodes of interviews at political rallies. The podcast is taking a back seat now while I focus on musical projects, but will continue as a monthly audio diary of sorts. You can hear Prairie Goth in pretty much all the usual podcast places, and the archive is available on Bandcamp. The website is my central hub for sharing new music, images, and poetry.

Monotypes is my archive of stems, available for anyone to use for non-commercial purposes, and you can download everything on Bandcamp for — are you noticing a pattern here? — $6.66/year. I love the idea of other artists or bands using my tracks as sampling material or whatever, even for so-called ‘commercial purposes,’ but I’m not using a wide-open Creative Commons license because I want some kind of legal recourse in case bigots (or super wealthy people) re-purpose my babies. My favorite example of a good use of one of my tracks, which I am totally honored by, is when Johnny Unicorn of Zorznijor used my drums for “The Ultimate Q & A.”

Other stuff.

I’ve gone on two tours to the west coast — 2010 and 2014 — and was the lead scheduler-type-person for each of them, doing the bulk of the promotional and administrative crap. The first tour was kind of a failure, and the second tour arguably broke even. If, um, the value of our time is, uh, zero dollars.

In 2013, I ran a successful Kickstarter to press vinyl for my split album, Girls Just Want to Have Gun. Even so, I’m still in the hole on this project, and I have way too many vinyl records sitting in boxes.

In 2014, I published a 44-page book of poetry called The Next Morning I Woke Up. Writing the book helped me understand my interest in mixing ‘dada techniques’ with my own style of ‘confessional’ writing, an aesthetic I’m continuing to chase.

I published a super limited-edition 240-page book of photography in 2014 called Maze Glassbooths, primarily based on photos I took in 2011 while living in my van for two months, traveling the Rocky Mountain, southwest, and west coast regions. I later used the images for album artwork.

In 2015, the improvisational project Tall Girlfriend began and then wrapped up after completing its 69th release. The project was a musical collaboration with a handful of longtime friends and bandmates. I performed on all but a release or two, and did the mixing and/or mastering — as well as the photography and graphic design — for each release.

I joined Vanity Plate as their drummer in 2015. I did the audio production for the first two EPs, as well as the graphic design, and the textile artwork featured on the cover of Quilt. In 2016, I quit Vanity Plate like a jerk.

From the mid-2000s to 2016, I played drums for the Juniper Drive. I was involved in the recording process, the graphic design, and (on one track) the songwriting for our 2016 release, A Brighter Future Underground.

Thank you so much for reading this! Being an artist is a real lonely journey, so I appreciate all of the encouragement I can get. A dollar a month is extremely kind, and makes a big difference to me & my heart.

Come hangout on the internet with me!

with love,Nora

Tiers

bumblebee moth

wonderpup

$3.03 or more per month

乁[ ◕ ᴥ ◕ ]ㄏ*･ﾟ｡ oh, I heard a rumour you're a curious one! this will give you access to all the ~~sneak peaks~~ I can muster up, including pre-release audio via the patron-only trash tapes podcast. Also you'll be profusely thanked in the digital 'liner notes' of the music I release during the time that you're pledging 🌼💙🌈

moon bunny

૮⍝◜•˕̮•◝⍝ა❀ this is an absurd amount of money that no one should give me, so if you do, I am wildly grateful!! 💖✨

You'll get a fancy shout out in the 'liner notes' of whatever I release while you're pledging, including physical things, if I ever publish anything irl ever again 🌙🐇

I'm gonna send you a nice ol' bubble mailer of ephemera on a monthly basis which may include things like miscellaneous papers, art, and four-track master cassettes. If the cost of shipping to you is higher than expected — or possibly if I'm traveling for an extended period of time — I'll send the same amount of material, but I'll mail it to you something like two or four times a year instead of twelve 💌🌸

Goals

57% complete

This will cover most of my hosting and file storage fees!

1 of 3

Hi there! I make a bunch of art and I’m bad at it.

Most of my efforts are directed towards music, audio production, podcasting, photography, graphic design, and poetry. I’m still working out the best ways to use Patreon, and I would love your suggestions. I want this to be fun! 💝💝

The first thing I’m gonna do here is make a patron-only podcast which you can get via the RSS feed here. I’m gonna call it trash tapes for now because a) that’s what it is and b) i have no better ideas. It’s less a ‘podcast’ — zero production value! — and more of like, the ultra audio dumpster I’ve always wanted to build. It’s yrs for the diving.

For the first while, everyone, including the bumblebee moths, will have access to 100% of the trash tapes (why? because no one likes me and I’m pretty sure literally only one person will sign up for this. that’s why) but come January 1st, 2020, only wonderpups & up will have access to most of the new stuff in the trash tapes. Pretend it’s a trial period or something. Also,

Please no one become a green mage. I’m serious.

that’s p much the gist of what’s up with this, but if u wanna know more, well here goes:

Ok so, long story long.

At the time of writing this, I’ve been a part of nearly 200 music releases, self-published three limited-edition books & zines, and produced about 50 podcast episodes.

Alright, uh, I feel like I’ve done a lot of things? but also I’m not anywhere close to breaking even financially. I’m currently working full-time to save up enough money so that I can spend a couple years practicing, writing songs, and hopefully traveling. Basically all I want to do in this life is make art and walk around. This is going to take a small amount of money, and then there’s also expensive junk I want to do, like zapping this stupid beard off of my face. I’m crossing my fingers for a world where I can have a couple part-time jobs, and that one of those jobs will be my own artwork.

Sometimes I get frustrated and depressed, which makes me need to take breaks from the more stressful art projects, but I hope my long pattern of activity will make you feel confident that your patronage is worthwhile.

I’ve been playing drums, writing songs, and experimenting with digital audio workstations since about 2002. I put out what I once considered to be my first so-called official release, a noise tape titled Frank, in 2008 when I was 16. Although, depending on whether your definition of ‘music album’ is a lil bit po-mo or not, my first ‘release’ was in like 2003.

Everything has been self-published and I’d like to mostly keep it that way.

My main musical project began officially in 2008, and I alternate between solo work and collaborations, with 15 releases comprising various albums, EPs, singles and mixtapes. You can download the archive, along with future releases, for $6.66/year on the Bandcamp subscription.

Citizen Scientist is my outlet for musical experimentation, with new music pretty much every Friday. Beginning in 2015 with a series of improvised noise rock albums, the 150th Citizen Scientist release is scheduled to be published by January 2020. You can download the archive, and future releases, for $6.66/year on the Bandcamp subscription.

Prairie Goth is the podcast and blog I started in late 2015. The podcast began as an excuse to have conversations with artists I admire, and grew to include various audio and spoken word experiments. In its first two and a half years, the show ran about 50 episodes, including about 30 interviews or conversations with artists, and two episodes of interviews at political rallies. The podcast is taking a back seat now while I focus on musical projects, but will continue as a monthly audio diary of sorts. You can hear Prairie Goth in pretty much all the usual podcast places, and the archive is available on Bandcamp. The website is my central hub for sharing new music, images, and poetry.

Monotypes is my archive of stems, available for anyone to use for non-commercial purposes, and you can download everything on Bandcamp for — are you noticing a pattern here? — $6.66/year. I love the idea of other artists or bands using my tracks as sampling material or whatever, even for so-called ‘commercial purposes,’ but I’m not using a wide-open Creative Commons license because I want some kind of legal recourse in case bigots (or super wealthy people) re-purpose my babies. My favorite example of a good use of one of my tracks, which I am totally honored by, is when Johnny Unicorn of Zorznijor used my drums for “The Ultimate Q & A.”

Other stuff.

I’ve gone on two tours to the west coast — 2010 and 2014 — and was the lead scheduler-type-person for each of them, doing the bulk of the promotional and administrative crap. The first tour was kind of a failure, and the second tour arguably broke even. If, um, the value of our time is, uh, zero dollars.

In 2013, I ran a successful Kickstarter to press vinyl for my split album, Girls Just Want to Have Gun. Even so, I’m still in the hole on this project, and I have way too many vinyl records sitting in boxes.

In 2014, I published a 44-page book of poetry called The Next Morning I Woke Up. Writing the book helped me understand my interest in mixing ‘dada techniques’ with my own style of ‘confessional’ writing, an aesthetic I’m continuing to chase.

I published a super limited-edition 240-page book of photography in 2014 called Maze Glassbooths, primarily based on photos I took in 2011 while living in my van for two months, traveling the Rocky Mountain, southwest, and west coast regions. I later used the images for album artwork.

In 2015, the improvisational project Tall Girlfriend began and then wrapped up after completing its 69th release. The project was a musical collaboration with a handful of longtime friends and bandmates. I performed on all but a release or two, and did the mixing and/or mastering — as well as the photography and graphic design — for each release.

I joined Vanity Plate as their drummer in 2015. I did the audio production for the first two EPs, as well as the graphic design, and the textile artwork featured on the cover of Quilt. In 2016, I quit Vanity Plate like a jerk.

From the mid-2000s to 2016, I played drums for the Juniper Drive. I was involved in the recording process, the graphic design, and (on one track) the songwriting for our 2016 release, A Brighter Future Underground.

Thank you so much for reading this! Being an artist is a real lonely journey, so I appreciate all of the encouragement I can get. A dollar a month is extremely kind, and makes a big difference to me & my heart.

Come hangout on the internet with me!

with love,Nora

Recent posts by Nora Nygard

Tiers

bumblebee moth

wonderpup

$3.03 or more per month

乁[ ◕ ᴥ ◕ ]ㄏ*･ﾟ｡ oh, I heard a rumour you're a curious one! this will give you access to all the ~~sneak peaks~~ I can muster up, including pre-release audio via the patron-only trash tapes podcast. Also you'll be profusely thanked in the digital 'liner notes' of the music I release during the time that you're pledging 🌼💙🌈

moon bunny

૮⍝◜•˕̮•◝⍝ა❀ this is an absurd amount of money that no one should give me, so if you do, I am wildly grateful!! 💖✨

You'll get a fancy shout out in the 'liner notes' of whatever I release while you're pledging, including physical things, if I ever publish anything irl ever again 🌙🐇

I'm gonna send you a nice ol' bubble mailer of ephemera on a monthly basis which may include things like miscellaneous papers, art, and four-track master cassettes. If the cost of shipping to you is higher than expected — or possibly if I'm traveling for an extended period of time — I'll send the same amount of material, but I'll mail it to you something like two or four times a year instead of twelve 💌🌸